Gifted and Silly

When he was three, he was reading the tabloids in the supermarket line. When he was five, we were riding in the car and he heard a song on the radio, we drove home and he banged the song out on the piano. Needless to say, we enrolled him in piano lessons at once. Two years later, he did the same with his fathers guitar. He started guitar lessons.
My child was tested and labeled as gifted and talented. I had already realized that that did not mean that it would be easier than raising a different child with different capabilities. It is, in fact and always has been, quite challenging raising him.
He is a definite joy and he is a definite challenge.
We placed him in Montessori school at the age of 4 and then he transferred to public school in first grade much to our dismay I might add.
From 1st grade to his graduation from elementary school this past Thursday, he has gotten straight A's and has been in gifted and talented class. He is incredible on the piano and always receives accolades for such. But no matter his intelligence, he is a kid. He is a kid that says silly things that make no sense.
Friday night I looked at the clock as I got into bed; 12:15. I feel asleep within 5 minutes because at 12:20, I was awoken by who I thought to be an intruder. It was my little boy (that is actually not so little as you can see).
"Mom", he whispered...."Mom"....
I woke with a start and he immediately began apologizing profusely.
"I'm sorry, I'm sorry Mom, it's just that my cartilage is growing". "WHAT?" , I said. "Your cartilage is growing?" He proceeded to show me his ears that were red and blistered. He thought that the blisters were his cartilage growing. It was sunburn. I treated the sunburn and ran right out the next day for sunscreen. A reminder that we need sunscreen...
So as intelligent as he is and as thankful as I am that he is so curious and loves learning, I am most thankful that he is a kid right now. He is a joy.
The same child that was reading at 2 and a half and is now reading on a 10th grade level, said to me one day riding in the car..
"Stop! Pull Over!" "It's a penguin. We just drove by a dead penguin on the side of the road!"
"Emil, we are in MD., there are no wild penguins here". "It is! It is and you are just going to let him die there!" I turned the car around, drove back to ensure him there was no penguin and so he insisted that the penguin had dragged himself off into the woods.
And he makes me smile. He makes everyone around him smile. That is another of his gifts. That is what I am most proud of; not his intelligence, not his musical wizardry but the fact that he is a kid. I'm most proud of him because he is a wonderful kid.